“Memorial Day weekend was a violent one in Chicago,” reports NEWSWEEK Magazine, “where at least 56 people were shot and a dozen people died in shootings.”
The weekend was likewise exceedingly deadly in Baltimore where 29 were shot, 9 of them fatally.
One Chicago resident downplayed the violence, saying the media makes it all sound worse than it is, and the situation is not as dire as it seems. “We know that this happens in very large metropolitan areas. Chicago is no different than what’s going on in Baltimore, Philly or Detroit,” said Asiaha Butler, president of the Resident Association of Greater Englewood, the Chicago neighborhood where at least three of the shootings are reported to have happened. “I stayed on my porch this entire weekend. I barbequed this weekend. I did not hear one gunshot.”
Not as dire as it seems? Really?
In a culture and society where anger and conflict are increasingly solved by the pull of a trigger, it seems familiarity is not breeding contempt but rather complacency. This is what sin does—over time, it dulls our senses and callouses our hearts.
God forbid we get used to such staggering displays of man’s anger run amuck. In God’s economy, to even think angrily against another constitutes murder, and it is every bit as “dire as it seems.”
“You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’ But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell” (Matthew 5:21-22, NLT).
An AP story published this morning (11/04/14) is thick with irony. Two community organizers “with a local Stop the Violence group” were arrested and jailed in Washington, Pennsylvania for, get this, “severely beating a former roommate with whom they had a property dispute” (FoxNews.com).
They “allegedly jumped the man as he was walking down the street on Tuesday." Police report that the defendants kicked the victim repeatedly while he was unconscious, causing serious injuries. The female defendant “was still wearing the same ‘Stop the Violence’ T-shirt that she had on the night before when she led a march in the city protesting two recent shootings."
The victim remains in critical condition.
Just weeks after the Boston Marathon bombing rocked the nation, nineteen people, including two children were shot during a New Orleans Mother's Day parade (5/12/13). While some were seriously injured, thankfully none were killed.
In an effort to assuage undue concern, the FBI was quick to declare that this "incident" was "strictly street violence," not terrorism--as if this should make us feel better.
There was a time when street violence--perpetrated by our own citizens within our own borders--was a big deal. Now it seems to pale in comparison to the violence of "terror" from without.
Violence of any type is troubling. But shouldn't the violence that happens on America's streets be even more concerning to us than any visited on us from abroad? After all, home grown violence speaks of our own moral and social decline. This is the violence of which the Scriptures warn which will be indicative of the latter days.
"But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God …" (2 Timothy 3:1-4).